Session 1
Conceptual Issues in RSH Research
Chair: Fereshteh Ahmadi
1. Materialism, Spiritual Intelligence and Religiousness - Theoretical Assumptions Regarding their (Co)relations and Empirical Scrutiny of those
Marcin Langer
Relations between spiritual intelligence, religiousness (independent variables) and materialism (dependent variable). Main research questions aimed to test if: Is there a relationship between spiritual intelligence, religiousness and materialism
Main objective: Empirically test theoretical assumptions of both theory of spiritual intelligence (SQ - Spiritual Intelligence) and religiousness (Judeo- Christian), with materialism. According to spiritual intelligence proponents and to religious doctrine, those ideologies strongly oppose materialism, while simultaneously being somehow antagonistic to each other. Materialism have been described as one of the most important factors affecting life in detrimental way, with numerous studies finding negative correlations between the materialistic attitude and life satisfaction, sense of happiness, self-fulfillment, vitality, self-respect and competence and maintaining valuable relationships.
Both (co)relations (spiritual intelligence and religiousness with materialism; spiritual intelligence with religiousness) were empirically tested.
Method: Multiple linear regression analysis of data collected from 200 Polish participants (57 males and 143 females, between 20 and 30 years old) measured with battery of tests.
Analysis: Correlations between religiosity/spiritual intelligence and materialism are in line with analyzed theories and doctrines, but effect size regarding SQ relations with materialism was weaker than that of religiousness (-0,21 to -0,35 Pearson’s r and ß=-0,09 and -0,32 respectively), while SQ and religiosity showed statistically significant positive correlations (r=0,16), both findings contradicting SQ theory. Value of adjusted coefficient of determination r2 of materialism variability explained by spiritual intelligence and religiousness found in the study was lower than predicted by theories of SQ and religious doctrine (R2=0,12), as well as beta coefficients being in line with theory regarding negative effect of both independent variables, but not entirely when looking at effect size (ß=-0,04 for SQ and ß=-0,11 for religiousness).
Conclusions: This study showed that although SQ and religiousness correlate negatively with materialism, both variables relation with materialism is significantly weaker than that concluded from describing them theories and doctrines. Secondly, this study found that spiritual intelligence is not exactly opposite to western religiosity represented by Catholic religion, which could lead to two types of conclusions regarding either the theory of SQ or Polish society - spiritual intelligence could in fact be a new type of religiosity, an modern answer to market demand of Western post-religious societies desperate to “believe in something” or Polish society, described by many philosophers and researchers as not affected by post-modernistic though school, prefers traditional, Judeo-Christian, pre-modernistic, forms of worship.
PowerPoint slides of the presentation (PDF)
2. What Faith Makes us Stronger? Religiosity Dimensions in Processes of Coherence
Agata Gozdziewicz-Rostankowska, Beata Zarzycka, Anna Tychmanowicz
Background: The sense of coherence (SOC) plays an important role in coping processes and thus determinates health and well-being of an individual. Religiosity belongs to a individual’s resistance resources and it is favorable towards the forming of SOC and towards handling life challenges. The relation between religiosity and the sense of coherence also refers to the ability of tapping into the resources offered by religion – people with a strong sense of coherence actively search for them, whereas people with a weak sense of coherence are not able to use them despite their potential availability.
Aim: The aim of the research was to analyze the effects of the following religiosity dimensions on the sense of coherence: the importance of the religious constructs system in personality (centrality of centrality), emotions towards God, the attachment to God and post-critical beliefs.
Methods: Participants were 636 adults, 332 women and 304 men, aged 18 to 78 (M=41.75, SD=16.79). The subjects declared Catholic affiliation. The following tools were applied: The Centrality of Religiosity Scale (C-15) and the Emotions towards God Scale (EtG) by Huber, the Attachment to God Questionnaire (KWB) by Matys and Bartczuk, the Post-Critical Beliefs Scale (PCBS) by Hutsebaut and The Sense of Coherence Questionnaire (SOC-29) by Antonovsky.
Results: To determine the effects of particular religiosity dimensions on the sense of coherence, the hierarchical regression was conducted. The analysis showed that the sense of coherence was best explained by means of the attachment to God dimensions and negative emotions towards God. The effects of the centrality of religiosity, positive emotions towards God and post-critical beliefs disappear after controlling attachment to God and negative emotions towards God.
Conclusions: Religiosity is an important source of the sense of coherence, and thus is a significant resource facilitating the coping with life’ challenges and promoting health. Particular religiosity dimensions have different input into the prediction of the sense of coherence. The results of this research let us suggest that the attachment to God and the emotional aspects of religious relationship are more strongly correlated with the sense of coherence than the cognitive and motivational aspects such as centrality of religiosity and cognitive attitudes towards religion.
3. The Moderation of Religious Trust on the Relationship of Personality Traits and Sense of Coherence: Can Religious Trust Defense Negative Effects of Neuroticism?
Philipp Kerksieck, Arndt Büssing, Klaus Baumann
Background: This research focuses on the interaction of Big Five Personality Traits, the salutogenetic concept of Sense of Coherence (SOC) and Religious Trust (RT) as an external locus of control. Can RT be a helpful resource in the case of negative influences of Personality Traits on SOC.
Aim: Studying a highly religious and spiritual sample within the German Pastoral Ministry Study, it is intended to 1) test the interaction of Personality Traits and SOC, 2) to examine the negative influence of the Personality Factor Neuroticism in SOC, 3) to measure the buffering impact of RT as a psychological resource in this negative influence.
Methods: Cross-sectional survey among Catholic pastoral workers: N = 5. 503 (75.6 % men, mean age = 55.9), using standardized questionnaires.
Results: Overall, Big Five factors are accounting for 30 % of variance in SOC. Neuroticism is the best (inverse) predictor of SOC, while Extraversion, Conscientiousness and Agreeableness are weak positive predictors. Not significantly related is Openness for Experiences.
To test the focal research hypothesis, the effect of RT as a moderator on the relationship of Neuroticism and SOC was analyzed. When RT was high, it had a buffering influence, and gained SOC despite the impairment of Neuroticism. Interestingly, the highest moderating influence of RT was measured in in those Individuals, who reported high Neuroticism. Those who experienced the largest impairment by this Personality Trait regarding SOC, can profit the most of RT.
Conclusions: Overall, this research has brought up at least two results in regard of religiousness as a parameter in personality and health related / salutogenetic topics. First, it is a significant result of this research that the solid and validated relationship of two relevant psychological concepts (i.e. the Big Five Personality Factors and SOC) experience statistical variation due to the moderation of RT.
Second, individuals with higher neuroticism scores may experience an impairment of their SOC. Those who are relying on RT as a psychological resource may (re-)establish their SOC and buffer negative effects of emotional instability by Neuroticism. This may contingently result in a more and more operant cycle that helps to foster SOC.
Thinking RT as a helpful resource and quantitatively prove it as related to Personality Traits and SOC may inspire further research and help to establish practice in curative treatment to persons who are interested in a spiritual orientation to their lives.
4. Outcomes of the Participation of a Philosophical Community of Inquiry (PCI) in a Care and Rehabilitation Perspective
Elisabeth Ansen Zeder, Joëlle Gaillard Wasser
The work of researchers such as Huguelet (2003) and Brandt (2010), as well as the psychiatrist Hell (2002) formed our basis at the beginning of the research project.
The aim of this research project was the implementation of a Philosophical Community of Inquiry (PCI) in an intermediary care institution for patients suffering from temporary psychoneurosis. It was based on the foundations of different theories and clinical practices:
- We refer to the philosophical practices of clinical psychologists (such as reported by Cinq-Mars, C. 2005; Ribalet, J., 2008; Loison-Apter, E. 2010; Remacle, M. & François, A.,2011 who use PCI in a clinical perspective.
- Practical psychotherapy, existential analysis or logotherapy (Frankl, 2006; Yalom, I, 2008) is our paradigm.
- Positive psychology which focuses on optimizing the forces that encourage human beings to exercise their inbuilt efficiency, their emotional and cognitive management and discover their talents, thereby increasing their development and learning capacity enabling them to deal with their suffering (Seligman, 1992; Seligman and Peterson, 2004).
- Care, a holistic approach to recovery and the importance of this approach by Provencher (2002), helped us to organize the evaluations of this experience through the patients.
How possible is it in psychotherapy to incorporate existential questions in relation to a transcendent or spiritual dimension as an integral part of our humanity? What outcomes could we expect for the participants in a PCI? We will demonstrate how we used “philofables”, (philosophical stories), and set up four (PCI) groups. Later, we asked patients for feedback that we recorded and examined. We then observed how the use of a fable as mediator, made possible:
Self-preservation and self-determination, the expression of free will
Expression of the will which defines human motivation
Participation in the search for a sentiment that implicates the emotions and the noetic to express hope, the overcoming of fears and desires of self.
The concept of Frankl's theory concerning logotherapy can explain these three points. Can the PCI become a tool to help us to integrate spirituality into a clinical gait of psychotherapy?